Steam is now offering pre-purchases of Call of Duty: Black Ops in advance of the release of the military shooter sequel on November 9. Valve also confirms the game will be using Steamworks for various functions, saying:

In addition to leveraging Steamworks' Auto-Updating, Achievements, and more, Call of Duty: Black Ops will support Steamworks Cloud technology. The PC version of the product will be powered with Steamworks for both the digital and tangible versions of the game and, as with all Steamworks titles, offline play will also be supported.

"We are delighted to be delivering the year's most anticipated title with Black Ops to PC gamers around the world," said Jason Holtman, director of business development at Valve. "We've collaborated with the development team to leverage the Steamworks suite of services to deliver the highest level of service to Call of Duty: Black Ops PC customers."

"Steam has been a great partner throughout development of Black Ops," said Mark Lamia, president of Treyarch. "We're working closely together to take full advantage of Steamworks to ensure we deliver the most polished and secure PC experience that our community deserves."

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Elessar wrote on Oct 22, 2010, 22:37:As an avid PC gamer, this doesn't bother me one bit. As long as there are a few servers I can return to and there is a community I'm happy. Matchmaking and p2p hosting felt so disconnected and fake.

Also, I love that ranked is maxed at 9v9. Less spam, spawn kills and allows for more strategic movement.

I'm of the same opinion. While I'd prefer true dedicated servers (or at least several hosting companies) I'm not too bothered by it. Heck, I've have trouble finding servers I like for TF2; more isn't always better.

IF 9v9 ranked is true, that's great news. I've been irritated by the constant increase in player counts for multi over the years. I've always preferred smaller, more tactical matches. Of course, the lack of proper mutliplayer has helped pull max player counts down, but that wasn't how I'd hoped it would happen.

And so begins, yet again, my love/hate relationship with the CoD series.